Forgetful

Forgetful

Forgetful. That's what everyone used to call me. Forgetful.

Gran would use it as my pet name when I was little. If I forgot my coat, or put my shoes on the wrong feet, or lost a mitten, she would say, laughing, "Oh, little Forgetful, what did you forget now?"

As I got older, she stopped laughing easily. She dropped my pet name and reverted to my real name. "Oh, Neville," my Gran would say, sighing deeply. I knew that I disappointed her, and the rest of my family, but I could not help it. That was simply the way I was.

I often wondered why I was so inclined to forget. I wondered if my forgetfulness was in any way connected to the fate of my parents. I had been only just a year old when they were captured. They were taken to a hideout by a group of You-Know-Who's followers, and there the Crutacius Curse was preformed. Ministry members who had tracked them down using information from spies rescued them. It was far too late.

I was at Gran's house when the news came. I was too young to remember. The doctors told my Gran that my parents had been under the influence of the curse for at least eighteen hours, and that the last hour had broken their minds completely; however, they had been so brave that they refused to talk, even than.

They had no recollection of the past, and now lived within a world of dreams and fantasies. My father, once the famous and renowned auror Frank Longbottom, now sits on a white-covered bed on the third floor of St. Mungo's Hospital, saying nonsense words all day long. My mother, previously the quiet and beautiful Eleanor Longbottom, sits on a bed next to him, staring off into space, occasionally letting out a strangled shout.

I, Neville Longbottom, their only son, who visits them every chance I have, I they neither see nor recognize.

Perhaps the lack of parents in my life played some part in my forgetfulness. I certainly often forget what I have to do, or bring, or say. Even at my great school, Hogwarts, there were problems. My Gran sent me a remembrall in my first year. A lot of good that did me! And who should wonder? All it did was give me notice that I had forgotten something, which was really no help at all, as I always had.

The Gryffindor password for the common room was a thing I had always had trouble with. "Pig Snout," I would say uncertainly, when the password was Fairy Lights. The portrait would refuse to let me in. I always confused past phrases with the present ones. The words I had to remember would get tangled together in my mind, and mix to form incoherent sounds. I could never remember a single one, and counted on the help of my friends.

I was not particularly good at any subject, except perhaps Herbology; however, Potions was my worst class from day one. I could tell the moment I stepped into the class that this would not be easy. It was even worse than I thought. It was impossible enough to memorize all the ingredients necessary in each concoction, but I hadn't counted on the fact that my teacher had a permanent nasty temper and had picked me out as his bullying victim. My friend Hermione Granger helped me through, but it was little consolation, as each class period grew steadily more torturous. I feared the potions master more than anything, and began to avoid any place where he might be. I could not do otherwise.

But other than these problems, school life was far better than life at home. At home, my Uncle Algie would constantly tell me I would never be a wizard, never be magic enough for Hogwarts. Home was where Auntie Enid fussed and bothered about everything from my hair to my shoes. It was where my Gran would always have the look in her eyes that told me I was disappointing her. And home was where I could never escape the fact that I was different; there were no parents at my home.

The most amazing part of school to me was that some people could accept me for who I was, and not who they wanted me to become. I was still Neville, the clumsy, forgetful kid, but they looked past that. It was wonderful to have friends to talk to and confide in, however, I kept what happened to my parents a secret. I was sure they would try to sympathize with me, but they could never understand what it feels like to go unrecognized to my parents, the ones I should love the most. I was also worried that if I told them, I would be more of an outcast than ever.

So I kept my secret. It was not an easy secret to keep, since everyone had family, who they talked about all the time, who sent them letters, and never failed to keep in touch. Everyone I knew had known that I lived with my Gran for a long time, but luckily for me, everyone either thought that I lived with her as well as my parents, or else simply didn't care enough to question it further. I worried that someone would find out, and lived in the fear that I would become an outcast.

Ever since I had been a child old enough to understand what had happened to my parents, I had had a terror of all of the Unforgivable curses, the Cruciatus Curse in particular. Any mention of it and I would be forced to remember what had happened to them. Sometimes I would imagine it happening to me: a high, cold, cruel voice saying "Crucio!" and then the pain...

It seemed to me that this was the worst of all of the curses, perhaps because it had been used on my parents, but also perhaps because the idea that someone could torture you for hours was worse than being killed immediately. I was lucky that no one at school seemed to know much about the Unforgivable, so I was free from having to discuss them.

That is, until my fourth year, when I found out, to my horror, that we were to learn about all of the curses in Defense against the Dark Arts. I entered the classroom nervously, and took a seat as near to the back as I possibly dared, while the rest of the class excitedly took seats near the front of the room. While the professor talked about the curses I barely paid any attention, but when he asked for what the curses were, I, to the surprise of everyone, including myself, raised my hand.

"The Cruciatus Curse," I said shakily, surprised at my own daring.

The professor looked at me carefully. "Your name is Longbottom?" he asked, consulting his list. I nodded, sure that he knew my parents. He was, after all, an auror, like my father. They must have known each other, I thought miserably, certain that my secret was out; however, to my surprise, he continued the lesson as though nothing had happened and said nothing more on the subject.

When the jar of spiders was taken out and placed on the desk, I realized what was going to happen to them and nearly cried out, only stopping myself just in time. While the first curse, the Imperious, was being performed, I could do nothing but think of the next, and forced myself to laugh with the others as the spider did tap dancing and tricks, though I didn't see what was so funny about it.

As the second spider was engorged, I stared at it intensely. "Act normal," a small voice in my head told me. "You don't want people to stare at you." But I could not help it. Everyone was staring at the spider now, watching it squirm uncontrollably, as though it knew what was going to happen to it.

"Crucio!" the professor cried, and the spider began to writhe madly; but I could not see it. I could only see dark figures in masks as my parents heard the inevitable word that would determine their fate.

"Crucio!"

On the edge of my consciousness, I heard Hermione scream shrilly, "Stop it!" I came back slowly to reality. I barely noticed that everyone in class was staring at me strangely. I could think of nothing else for all of what the professor called the "last and worst" curse. When the bell rang, I gathered my books and left the classroom, for once not tripping on my way out, but feeling oddly separate from the other students the whole while. As I walked down the hall, I tried to act normally to my friends, but they could tell that something was very wrong.

About halfway down the hall, the professor caught up with us. He told me to come back to the class with him. Reluctantly, I obeyed, returning to the classroom. I expected him to immediately mention my parents; however he only handed me a cup of tea and strode back over to his desk, where a book lay, face up. Magical Water Plants of the Mediterranean.

"Professor Sprout told me that you are getting to be quite advanced in Herbology," he growled, as he picked the book up and handed it to me. "I never read it, but I thought you might be interested, seeing as how you're interested in plants. Why don't you try it?"

"When do you need it back, Professor Moody?" I asked, amazed that Professor Sprout had mentioned me to him. I knew that Herbology was my own best subject, but not that I was so good at it.

"That's all right, sonny. You don't have to give it back when you're done. Just keep it."

"Th-Thank you, Professor Moody," I said gratefully.

"Your quite welcome, Longbottom," he said gruffly. Then, underneath the gruffness, I saw a hint of something else. Uncertainty? Remorse? Anger? I couldn't tell which it was, because it was there only a second, but I was certain I had seen it. I started heading out, thanking him once more.

"Longbottom," he called after me, "don't forget to read chapter three. I found that chapter particularly entertaining." When I got to my dorm I looked at that chapter. It was called "Gillyweed and Other Plants of the Northwest Shore."

It was not until I lay awake that night, thinking about the events of that day, that I realized that he had said earlier that he had not read the book.

* * *

Besides this incident, there was never the need to face my problems at school. My memory for small things and large alike remains as bad as ever to this day. Someday, I hope to have the courage to tell my secret to my friends. Until then, for me it is so easy to forget, and so painful to remember.